The Smiley Smile Message Board

I don’t really consider myself a Parrothead, but like the early Beach Boys he definitely painted a picture of beach life with his music and entertained a huge following.  Recently on a trip to the beach, a friend was playing music from an American Reggae band called Stick Figure and I found one of their songs was written by Jimmy Buffet:

https://youtu.be/Zes3M6JM_EE

Nice comments from Paul McCartney on FB:

“It seems that so many wonderful people are leaving this world, and now Jimmy Buffett is one of them. I’ve known Jimmy for some time and found him to be one of the kindest and most generous people.

I remember once on holiday when I had forgotten to bring my guitar and was itching to play. He said he would get me one of his, but I said, ‘I’m left-handed’. So, Jimmy had his roadie restring one of his guitars which he loaned me for the duration of the holiday. He then followed this act of generosity by giving me my own beautiful left-handed guitar that had been made by one of his guitar-making pals. It’s a beautiful instrument, and every time I play it now it’ll remind me of what a great man Jimmy was.

He had a most amazing lust for life and a beautiful sense of humour. When we swapped tales about the past his were so exotic and lush and involved sailing trips and surfing and so many exciting stories that it was hard for me to keep up with him.

Right up to the last minute his eyes still twinkled with a humour that said, ‘I love this world and I’m going to enjoy every minute of it’.

So many of us will miss Jimmy and his tremendous personality. His love for us all, and for mankind as a whole.

Last, but not least, is his songwriting and vocal ability. If someone made an interesting remark he repeated it in his gorgeous Louisiana drawl and said, ‘That’s a good idea for a song’. Most times it didn’t take too long for that song to appear. I was very happy to have played on one of his latest songs called ‘My Gummy Just Kicked In’. We had a real fun session and he played me some of his new songs. One, in particular, I loved was the song, ‘Bubbles Up’. And I told him that not only was the song great but the vocal was probably the best I’ve heard him sing ever. He turned a diving phrase that is used to train people underwater into a metaphor for life when you’re confused and don’t know where you are just follow the bubbles - they’ll take you up to the surface and straighten you out right away.

So long, Jim. You are a very special man and friend and it was a great privilege to get to know you and love you. Bubbles up, my friend.”.

Love, Paul

Let's not forget that Jimmy Buffet also co-wrote and sang backing vocals on Brian's "South American". Here's video of the two of them recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pxQjphssSYI

R. I. P.

Thanks for sharing - I wonder what The Beach Boys trick he figured out was….

I'm glad someone else caught this too! I've been wondering what Jimmy was referring to since I first saw that video over 20 years ago after Imagination came out. I always guessed it was manually doubletracking or even triple-tracking harmony vocals to create that natural chorusing effect and make the harmonies sound huge on those records, compared to only laying down one track. Then I thought well, no, it's been pretty standard practice when doing harmony vocals since the 1960's to fatten them up by manually doubletracking, and the chorusing-fattening effect was only enhanced when you folded all those voices down to mono back in the day. Then I thought did he mean slowing the tape down to cut vocals lower then speeding them back up to create a different sheen or hit notes out of the singer's range, but that too has been done since the 60's and by the late 90's digital recording and DAW's had pretty much taken over the studios anyway so slowing tape was antiquated except for analog devotees who still cut to tape machines. And surely Jimmy in all the albums he recorded would have come across those same "old school" recording tricks before working on that track with Brian. Or maybe he didn't and the way he cut his own records wasn't in the same direction as Brian was producing and cutting with the BB's.

I always leaned toward the manual doubletracking of the harmony vocals - simple as it may seem - but it's definitely a mystery I've been thinking about since I first saw that broadcast. Only Jimmy and Brian (and the people in the studio) knew what he meant I guess.

Yeah that seems like a good guess to me - thank you.

Also in case anyone wasn’t already aware there is a posthumous song already released entitled Bubble Up:
 https://youtu.be/6j3jDTOG7yI?si=PABa4PmMOYM-7eLJ

sail on Jimmy

he put Sail On Sailor on an album and covered it live:
https://youtu.be/4WSXCUZjPLA?si=kmll97QD74owyrOY